Cosina announces its fastest full-frame lens, the Nokton 50mm F1 VM

I shoot almost only manual lenses with an a7R3, with focus magnification and practice you would have no problem at all with portraits at f 1.2 (the fastest I have😁).

@Becksvart the Leica M's rangefinder is an extremely precise optico-mechanical instrument, and can cope reliably with a 50mm f/1 down to reasonable distances. However, its precision is directly dependent on the calibration of the lens's cam and of each of the moving parts of the camera's rangefinder mechanism. Such calibration can be impacted by temperature, wear and tear, etc, and, well, a micron here and there impacts focus reliability. That is why a Leica M benefits from regular CLA trips. Another point of uncertainty is the fact that due to the very nature of rangefinder focusing, one must focus-recompose, which, as we know, introduces a degree of focus imprecision. These are elements of FUD familiar to Leica M shooters; I would personally not rely on a high res digital Leica M + 50mm/1 without a Visoflex EVF for critical paid work, but it is fun to use. The Leica M is pleasantly quirky.

@TFD
What are you talking about?

No. It clearly say you are Kaqpa, but nice try.

I don’t think they would bother if it couldn’t be used on mirrorless. Cosina know perfectly well that that’s where the market is...

blessingx - sure, I have a number of them. All dating from the last century! 4 Olympus Zuiko primes and a Zeiss T* prime, among them. It's just nice to see a brand new lens of traditional being announced.

What is the relevance of that observation about AF-C to this discussion of a manual focus lens?

One should try night wildlife for a challenge.

>What is the relevance of that observation about AF-C to this discussion of a manual focus lens?
Because it would work with an AF adaptor to E mount and possibly others. Some combinations of adaptor and body may support AF-C.

Agree, I found focus peaking not only not accurate enough, whole bunch of things turn red, yellow or whatever color, it's also super annoying, focus magnification is so much easier and a lot more reliable.

Alastair,

Sorry, I should have made myself clear. The reason I mentioned autofocus was because: 1) there are AF adapters you can take advantage of with manual lenses; 2) I wanted to highlight that using ultra-fast AF primes wide open is actually effortless on modern cameras, much unlike with DSLRs that often had trouble focusing or only focused stopped down.

In view of this, handing over $2k for a manual lens now makes even less sense than it did several years ago. For Sony, there is a native 50mm F1.2 GM with stellar IQ for the exact same price. I suppose you could find similar deals for other systems as well. You might disagree, but for most kinds of photography, nailing focus wide open is crucial, especially when the DOF is several millimeters thin. Focus misses are too easily avoidable nowadays to go manual, IMO.

@Pseu_Pseu_Pseudonym—Indeed. Also, you can use lenses for subjects further away than an arm's length.

You guys are way too serious.

We probably wouldn't be if there weren't so many people seriously complaining about too shallow depth of field on fast lenses...

This lens (any lens) can be used close up at f4.0 as well.

Not that close up. This lens has a close focusing distance of 35.5", according to this article, which is remarkable far for a 50mm lens.

Quite normal for a dedicated rangefinder lens. Some recent rangefinder lenses offer shorter close focusing distances to accommodate for usage on mirrorless digital cameras, but they'll still be limited there on actual rangefinder cameras.

I just completed a shoot with the Sigma 35 1.2, all wide open, mostly full body shots.

Both eyes, arms, legs, hair in focus.
Backgrounds a beautiful mess of colour.

Keen to see how a faster longer lens would render subjects and background in the same type of shoot.

I looked it up.. wow! Did it improve your vision a lot?

Mr Bolton
Think of it more as attempting to save what I have :)
So far, so good.

There also are AF adapters for attaching M-Mount lenses to Sony E-Mount (and, if I remember correctly, for Nikon Z since recently.)

Grinding aspherical elements is very difficult if you don’t want to leave extremely ugly circular marks that end up showing in the oof highlights.

Those are the reasons why I sold the first 3 Otus. The 100mm f1.4 is mostly free of them and so is the Nikon 58mm f0.95 Noct.

Another example of a lens ruined by those marks is the Canon 28-70mm f2.0. The oof highlights marks make this lens pretty much unusable in night scenes without application of the PS lens blur tool for the background.

So not all companies master the optical technology even today.

I just love that Nikon made that lens.

Since all of the Chinese f/0.95 lenses are terrible, I do not see the comparison here.

Only Nikon and Leica have managed to make usable modern lenses at this level, and you pay for them accordingly.

The Leica 50mm f/0.95 isn't sharp or superb optically, unlike the 58mm Noct.

So you’re getting an f1 for less than an f1.2 on other mounts? I don’t see the problem...

@tassienick the problem is focusing manually at f1!

Focusing manually at f1 on static subjects is easy on mirrorless bodies. At least on my Nikon Z7II.

have you tried focusing an F1 lens?

If the question is intended for me yes, I own a copy of the 58mm f0.95 Noct and I use it wide open most of the time.

k.

It's only $500 more than the Fuji 50mm f1 that has AF, and which I've shot.

At f1, you're rangefinder coupling must be pretty well aligned!

From my experience, while I myself don't have anything faster than f/1.2 yet (on FF), faster lenses make manual focusing easier, not harder. If they're sufficiently sharp wide open, that is. If they're not, it's the lack of sharpness that makes focusing harder, not the large aperture.

"Problem is the price isn't that far from 50 f1.2 with AF on other mounts." How is that a problem?

Cosina is also producing the Otus lenses for Zeiss.

It can be argued that they are the best lens manufacture in the world.

They aren't just using the name Voigtlander -- they're a die hard Voigtlander culture, they LOVE it.

Autofocus with a manual lens?

Yes AF with a manual lens. There have been different types of AF adapter for manual focus lenses for decades ever since AF became a thing.

@Bob Janes - I have an old used Fuji which I love, but it's not quite the same to adapt. I think it'd be neat if there was an actually affordable actual rangefinder, since that's a really nifty and unique kind of photography.

That is to say, it's a both-and. The alternatives can be great, but it'd be nice if there was an option which wasn't a work around.

Indeed Chessesteak, there is an AF adapter that autofocuses I believe M mount lenses on Sony E mount. Since the E mount has a shorter flange-back distance it doesn't need any optics. The adapter works as a belows, extending and retracting with focus - the adapter itself autofocuses with no need for any lens action. This may not work well with modern lenses with floating element designs for close focus where extension in the adapter would cause deterioration in image quality of the lense's focus point and subject distance were not aligned. But for lenses without floating elements it should work quite nicely and autofocus just about any Leica M mount lens on Sony E.

@cheesesteak I have this AF adapter, and even Eye-AF works... I am not sure accuracy is on par with recent native AF lenses, but it helps...

Fred the Swede, there is one for Z mount as well. Not sure about other mounts, but I think the X mount has one as well.

I know this is a joke, but I'd love it if more of the manual lens manufacturers made basic telephoto lenses.

Why not some 135/2.8 lenses (ideally 135/2)? Or a 200/4 even? Maybe that would be awkward for rangefinder focusing, but they'd be fine on mirrorless. Those focal lengths and speed were pretty common, and while you could adapt old film lenses, having that kind of simple telephoto get a slight update for the digital age would be pretty neat.

TTArtisans doesn't sell anything longer than 50mm for APS-C, and neither them nor Cosina sell anything longer than 90mm for FF Rangefinders. Samyang/Rokinon makes some longer focal lengths, but it'd be great to see more options.

@theBitterFig: there are already quite some 2.8/135 manual lenses available, both in SLR- and rangefinder mount. Many are actually quite good and affordable.

@Sjak - don't get me wrong, I'm tempted by the Rokinon 135/2, but I'm not seeing a tonne of other options. Lots of old glass to adapt, but not as much new. Mitakon Zhongyi has a 135/2.5 for FF mirrorless, but then there's nothing under $1000 for for mirrorless, and nothing under $4000 for rangefinder. At least, not on B&H or Adorama.

I guess what I mean is that I like what, say, TTArtisans has done with budget vintage-ish lenses for mirrorless, but they don't go beyond short-telephoto. I like my old adapted Pentax-M 200mm f/4, but it'd be cool to see new options.

A yes, I was mostly referring to vintage glass. Discontinued, but not ancient, is the Elmarit-M 135/2.8, but it's also not exactly small. I don't use tele a lot, so never looked into current 135mm-options, although I've read good things about that Samyang/Rokinon 2/125.

https://www.ephotozine.com/articles/sigma-105mm-f-1-4-dg-hsm-art-sample-photos-33713/images/highres-Sigma-105mm-f1-4-Art-Lens-4-Custom_1561571031.jpg

So your basic 105mm f1.4 is a stubby megaphone of a lens that makes a fat DSLR look like Ricoh GR. Imagine twice the length and a stop faster. It will look like https://pixelpluck.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/leica-1600mm-lens2.jpg

So what?

A digital rangefinder is not autofocus.
None of the Leica digital rangefinders (the M series cameras) are autofocus.
All you need is a desire to do it and capability to build a good rangefinder to equal the precision of what is in the Leicas. A number of Japanese manufacturers such as Minolta made film rangefinders back in the 1960s. I had one, loved it.

I like the smallest lenses possible with my Leica M bodies, even if I have a little IQ penalty. For example, I have the 135grms 21mm f4 which is diminutive and awesome. I am interested in the 35mm f1.4 mark ii. The 40mm can be find very cheap and it is also excellent and very compact. I dont know if I would picke the bigger/heavier f1.2 over it.

One of the oldies with no so many positive reviews is the Ultron 28mm f2. (The new, $900 version ii is awesome).

Agree about the importance of size; it's also an important concern for my M/LTM-lenses. The smallest of all are my 1938 3.5cm Elmar, and 1939 FED 28mm f/4.5. But e.g. my Summicron-90 is a special-occasion-only lens as it's not the best balancing lens on an M.

Are you aware that Cosina manufactures all the high end Zeiss lenses including the Otus?

They may be the best lens manufacturer on earth. Not at all in the same class as their cheap Chinese competitors.

I am not saying that their Voigtlander viewfinder lenses offer Otus level quality but the manufacturing know how is simply second to none.

It isn't allowed to fly...

lol zakk9!!!

Haha @zakk9. Actually 'grounded' means 'well balanced and sensible'. So not really true of this lens.

Cant leave the house

So many great answers and I'm going to be boring...
With aspheric glass elements you can mould them or grind (kinda polish) them...
Of course you'll have ground the surfaces of the mould if you went that way... makes nice onion rings in the bokeh balls...

It was naughty.

Thank you frozentime!

It's due to speed. The brighter the lens, the harder to have a close MFD. Parallax is part of it, but not all of it. For example, most Cosina Voightlander rangefinder lenses have a 70cm MFD, rather than 90cm like this. That's a bit of a difference, but not that huge given the rangefinder design constraints. Those last 20cm are almost surely due to optical constraints.

By way of illumination: Fuji's APS-C 50/1 has a 70cm MFD on mirrorless, where there isn't a parallax issue, their 56/1.2 has also a 70cm MFD, but the 50/2 as a 39cm MFD.

@gefrorenezeit: M-mount allows up to 70cm mfd, so 90cm is not the limit. I think it's probably a design decision; many other f/1 rangefinder-lenses go to about 1m; e.g. the current Noctiux goes to 1m. The TTartisan 0.95/50 goest to 70cm though, but according to reviews, that is not just a blessing.

For adapting, you can get an adapter with internal helicoid, which will get you closer. But I think Cosina has its reasons to limit the MFD to 90cm instead of the more common 70cm. Maybe something to do with focus shift at close range or, some other compromises that come with an ultra-fast lens in a small package?